Re: Church of the Old Time Commonsense with Understanding Following, with Pastor O'Barr

"Gerald L. O'Barr" wrote:

[snip]

> Reany wrote:
> >In Newtonian mechanics matter is modeled as point
> >mass particles in motion.  So, give us a proved
> >workable theory that satisifes this modeling
> >constraint. I'm not interested in any hypothesis you
> >have that tries to get there, but doesn't.
>
> O'Barr comments:
>    Do it yourself, Reany!  It will get you nowhere!

I'm not championing that cause; you are. You may have replaced the
point-mass particle model of Newton with so-called "spall" model, yet
the fanatical cause of "explaining" SR is yours, not mine.

> Reany wrote:
> >But the issue to which I was replying is your claim
> >that "the ether approach is that all of physics
> >remains Newtonian within all these concepts." So, I
> >merely pointed out how you've conveniently ignored
> >that fact that in Newton's mechanics no absolute
> >velocities was used but in LET it is. Therefore, LET
> >is NOT completely Newtonian.

>
> O'Barr comments:
>    In Newtonian physics, there is the velocity of
> sound in air.  A very fixed constant for fixed
> standard conditions.  There is absolutely no loss of
> Newtonian physics to present a theory where there is
> a fixed velocity of light in an ether.  You are
> wasting my time, Reany.  Is that intentional?

If you don't understand that you've provided an inertial-frame-relative
example in place of what should have been an absolute-frame example,
then you just don't understand what the fundamental issue is with
"absolute velocity spaces." The implicit frame that you indicated in
your "example" is the rest frame of the air (which is approximately
inertial for some time interval) in which the sound is moving; and THAT
frame has nothing to do with ANY absolute reference frame for assigning
absolute velocities. This is all too common an occurence to people who
blithely talk about VELOCITY without carefully considering the frame in
which the velocity is to be measured.

>
>
> Reany wrote:
> >  . . .  In Newtonian mechanics the simple Addition
> >of Velocities holds and there is no upper limit of
> >speed. Is this true for LET?
>
> O'Barr comments:
>     LET is not presented as the theory of everything.

Well, you sure make claims for it being so, don't you.

>
> LET does not say what velocities might exists within
> the ether itself.  But if you want someone to hold
> your hands, LET complies with the simple addition of
> velocities, and the at theory includes velocities up
> to infinity for the particles that make up the ether.
> Take a simple spall, and track the velocity as the
> mass of a spall appraches zero!

?

[snip]

> Reany wrote:
> >Oh, how the educational system has failed with you.
> >You think that a successful physical theory is
> >necessarily a true theory. How unscientific you are.
>
> O'Barr comments:
>    It is unscientific to believe that there is no
> truth.

That depends on how you define "truth" and on how you want to use the
word in the context of physics. In any case, your dogma that "it is
unscientific to that there is not truth" is not responsive to the point
I had made anyway. I never claimed that there is no "truth"; I suggested
that it is irrational to maintain that a successful physical theory is
necessarily a "true" theory. If you believe that to be true, though, you
can argue the case to us now.


>  What we must do as men is to be sure that we
> are humble enough to know that we might not ever have
> all of it.

That's not the right point to make. The right point is that we have no
means to KNOW that we have any "truth" obtainable by use of physics. The
reason for this is the bootstapping problem: You have to start with
Truth to be able to use it to measure out the truth of something else.
That's why 300 years ago people were all into Rationalism to justify
starting off with "TRUTH" -- which was anything they decided to call
"TRUTH."


>  And thus, many things might remain
> uncertain.  But many things will be certain, and it
> would be wrong to deny the things we know, just
> because we might be uncertain about other things!

What, then, are the "certain" things in your mind that physics tells us
that we "know"?

[snip]

> Reany said:
> >I think that getting by on two reference frames to
> >analyze the relative motion of two objects as being
> >superior to three reference frames to accompish the
> >same job -- the third being the rest frame of the
> >ether. I prefer logical economy. That is scientific!
>
> O'Barr comments:
>     But you are making up stories.  The ether math
> will allow you, Reany, to only use two frames.  To
> me, every point you make is a waste of time.  It
> either is not correct, or if it is correct, it is not
> important.  You surely should get off this net, or
> confine your remarks to the physics.  The physics
> says that LET is superior to SR.

Then get off this net yourself, for you just made the NON-physics value
judgment that LET is superior to SR. Value judgments are NOT physics!

Besides, you were too blind to see that I had put you on the horns of a
dilemma when I possed the two-frame problem above: If you contradicted
me, you'd have to prove why two frames aren't enough; but if you agreed
with me (which you did), you'd have to make the same argument that
Einstein himself made in 1905, which is that the absolute rest frame of
the ether is superfluous to doing physics. If the absolute rest frame of
the ether is admitted (as it is in LET), it's admitted as a liberty, not
a necessity, for doing physics. (Besides, I find it interesting that
Einstein tells us that Lorentz himself did not discover that the Lorentz
transformations form a mathematical group.)

> LET provides the
> exact same math as SR, plus it brings with it the
> physical explanations as to why the math works.  It
> also provides the limits that must be applied to the
> math, the correct interpretations to the math, the
> approach to take to learn more, and the connection to
> all other physical theories.

Except that no one has proven any of these bloated claims of yours yet.
It's all wishful thinking on your part.

[snip]

> Reany wrote:
> > ...In my mind you are religious because you
> >actually believe in the existence of this ether
> >which is not mechanical or useful for anything else
> >but electrodynamics. No simple mechanical model of
> >it has ever been constructed. Why do you ignore the
> >fact that LET says nothing about the stability of
> >the atom or about radioactive decay, which is very
> >accurately accounted for in QM?
>
> O'Barr comments:
>    And what I am to do with all these questions?

You said it yourself: "It [your spall-based LET] also provides the
limits that must be applied to the math, the correct interpretations to
the math, the approach to take to learn more, and the connection to all
other physical theories." You say that using spalls is your new venture
to save LET, then go for it, but included in that "all other physical
theories" you mentioned are the two questions I posed to you from QM.

>
> Anything that is done with SR math can also be done
> with LET math.  Somehow, you just do not seem to get
> this, that they really are the same math theory.
>    If you could really establish that there were a
> measurable difference between them, then science
> could decide between them.  But since there are no
> real differences, then neither you nor science can
> make a distinction.

Well, then how do YOU distinguish them?

>  So what do you think you make
> yourself to look like,  when you go around tooting
> that there are all these  differences?  Do not just
> ask questions, some of which are not even under
> discussion.  Present the facts, Reany!  This is a
> science post, not a talk show!

You just don't seem to get it, O'Barr. No reputable physicist, including
Einstein, has ever claimed that SR is a foundation by itself for all of
phyisics. QM says somethings which are independent of the claims that
can be made on the basis of SR alone. Therefore, it does no good to say
that LET is the same math as SR for the purpose of establishing LET as a
basis for all of physics, because that can only get you as far as SR can
go, and that isn't as far as your claims for LET go, not by a long shot!

Patrick